Jeff Randall is to quit his eponymous Sky News business show next July, and plans to step away from his full-time media commitments, including an almost three-decade relationship with the Daily Telegraph.

The 59-year-old, who has fronted Jeff Randall Live on Sky News since late 2007, intends to stand down after seven years when his contract expires next summer.

"My show has worked well and my contract runs until the end of 2015, but I will be 60 next year and there are plenty of things that I want to do next," said Randall, a former editor-at-large of the Daily Telegraph and ex-BBC business editor.

"I'm not necessarily retiring, as such, but I am walking away from a full-time commitment to work. I suspect I will take up a small portfolio of paid and pro bono activities, but with lots more spare time for travel to New Zealand, golf, horseracing, red wine, cigars and beach."

Randall, who is understood to have handed in his resignation to Sky at the end of last week to fulfil a contractual obligation of one year's notice, is also contracted to the Daily Telegraph until the end of 2013.

It is understood that Randall, who has worked on and off at the newspaper since 1986, intends to ask if the contract might be extended until the end of July 2014 to dovetail with the end of his Sky deal.

"There are a number of push-and-pull factors, including some personal reasons," said Randall, explaining his decision to effectively retire from day-to-day media roles. "I think time is short and I want to leave while I am still near the top. While Sky still wants me to stay."

He added that he still has a love of the job, but that he is acutely aware of not wanting to overstay his welcome on TV screens.

"There are plenty of figures on TV that have hung around too long," he said. "They are bored, tired, you can just tell. I want to get out before that happens to me."

Randall joined Sky in September 2007 on a part-time basis to launch a half-hour programme on Monday evenings.

The show proved a success and in 2009 he joined Sky News on a permanent basis – prompting him to step down as Daily Telegraph editor-at-large and cut back from two columns a week to one.

Randall had been the editor-at-large at the Daily Telegraph since 2005, where he was responsible for scoops including the defection of Michael Grade from the BBC to ITV.

When Randall joined full time, Sky expanded the business programme to four nights a week – Monday to Thursdays.

Randall said that the "game-changing" moment for the programme, which he added was fervently backed by Sky chief executive Jeremy Darroch, was in 2010 when it was moved from Osterley into the heart of the City in the Gherkin building.

"At Osterley [Sky's HQ], you'd get chief executives once, not twice, as it was a bit of a horrendous journey," he said. "[The Gherkin studio] is the financial equivalent of Sky having a broadcasting arm at Westminster."

The move coincided with the show being beefed up once again, this time to four one-hour shows a week, and cutting back his Daily Telegraph responsibilities to one column a month.

It is not clear what Sky News, under the leadership of John Ryley, will do about replacing Randall.

One option is to rebrand the show with the name of a replacement, or to use a more generic name such as Business Night. There are thought to be a number of internal and external candidates keen to take on the job.

Randall was enticed to join Sky after interviewing the broadcaster's then chief executive James Murdoch for his BBC Radio 5 Live show Weekend Business. Murdoch became a fan of the idea of a similar business programme for TV, and eventually convinced Randall to join and front it.

Between 2001 and 2005, Randall held the role of business editor at the BBC, the corporation's first.

From 1998 to 2001, he was editor of the Barclay brothers' financial weekly newspaper Sunday Business.

Randall spent almost a decade at the Sunday Times, between 1989 and 1998, holding a number of posts including City editor, assistant editor and sports editor.

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